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What is "altar"

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altar
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
altar
noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
altar boy
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADJECTIVE
high
▪ Within a dozen yards, I came to a set of iron gates closing off the steps east of the high altar.
▪ The high Baroque altar with its twisted columns in varied marbles is by members of the Platzer family.
▪ The red sanctuary lamp glowed ahead of them, to the left of the high altar.
▪ It has a high altar with fine gilded carving and a sixteenth-century sculpture of Our Lady of the Rosary.
▪ Dhani and Ian broke into a run, taking the high altar steps three at a time.
▪ The burial place was surrounded by the crypt and above it, in the church, was the high altar.
▪ He thought of little Rosamund and went to the high altar where the great missal lay.
▪ It has a fine gilded carving on the high altar.
main
▪ The latter's relics rest on the main altar.
▪ In 1106 the remains were all interred near the main altar of the new church.
▪ Brandl painted the Holy Family on the main altar and the picture of St Theresa.
▪ The main altar of 1760 is by J. Kramolín and portrays St Clement himself.
■ NOUN
boy
▪ In grade school Gary had served as an altar boy.
▪ My boyfriend was an altar boy.
▪ Yet he ended his days at daily mass, even serving for the priest when the altar boy of the day overslept.
▪ When Michael had been an altar boy he had also stolen the lead from the church roof!
▪ The civil case also was looming, filed by six former altar boys against Llanos and the archdiocese.
▪ But, through a tawdry heap of bushes, he watched the procession and the bare wooden coffin lifted by altar boys.
▪ In all, more than 20 young men, many of them former altar boys, came forward with similar stories.
cloth
▪ Some one had hung up all these colourful banners, and altar cloths, and pictures of knights and castles.
▪ Aren't these lovely altar cloths and tapestries?
■ VERB
kneel
▪ Then we knelt before the altar of the can - and pulled the handle.
▪ She was a child again and she was kneeling at the altar waiting to receive her first Communion.
▪ Statues of unknown saints looked gravely down from their alcoves as Jacques and Marie-Christine knelt reverently before the altar.
▪ Binh and I knelt before the family altar and bowed three times.
▪ There were maybe twenty or twenty-five people kneeling around the altar.
place
▪ A new candle was placed on the altar as I stood at the door.
▪ After this solemn function, the body was placed above a side altar in a crystal urn.
stand
▪ It is said that he stood before the altar and for a moment the Blade called to him.
▪ A charred baby carriage still stood on the altar steps, exactly where it had been found after the massacre.
▪ As the man reached the floor and stood beside the altar, he turned and gazed out at them.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ It was my job to light the candles on the altar.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ All the pews have been removed from inside but the font and the altar rail remain.
▪ Aren't these lovely altar cloths and tapestries?
▪ Beside the altar, four small wreaths rested on brass stands.
▪ Corrada was not altogether comfortable with altar girls.
▪ Graceful, narrow arches supported by Corinthian columns flank its altar and frame its windows.
▪ She will not have her altar stained with human blood.
▪ The table drew the eye like an altar.
Related phrases:
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Altar

Altar \Al"tar\, n. [OE. alter, auter, autier, fr. L. altare, pl. altaria, altar, prob. fr. altus high: cf. OF. alter, autier, F. autel. Cf. Altitude.]

  1. A raised structure (as a square or oblong erection of stone or wood) on which sacrifices are offered or incense burned to a deity.

    Noah builded an altar unto the Lord.
    --Gen. viii. 20.

  2. In the Christian church, a construction of stone, wood, or other material for the celebration of the Holy Eucharist; the communion table.

    Note: Altar is much used adjectively, or as the first part of a compound; as, altar bread or altar-bread.

    Altar cloth or

    Altar-cloth, the cover for an altar in a Christian church, usually richly embroidered.

    Altar cushion, a cushion laid upon the altar in a Christian church to support the service book.

    Altar frontal. See Frontal.

    Altar rail, the railing in front of the altar or communion table.

    Altar screen, a wall or partition built behind an altar to protect it from approach in the rear.

    Altar tomb, a tomb resembling an altar in shape, etc.

    Family altar, place of family devotions.

    To lead (as a bride) to the altar, to marry; -- said of a woman.

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Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
altar

Old English alter, altar, from Latin altare (plural altaria) "high altar, altar for sacrifice to the great gods," perhaps originally meaning "burnt offerings" (compare Latin adolere "to worship, to offer sacrifice, to honor by burning sacrifices to"), but influenced by Latin altus "high." In Middle English, often auter, from Old French auter. Reintroduced from Latin 1500s. As a symbol of marriage, by 1820.

Wiktionary
altar

n. A table or similar flat-topped structure used for religious rites.

Related phrases:
WordNet
altar

  1. n. the table in Christian churches where communion is given [syn: communion table, Lord's table]

  2. a raised structure on which gifts or sacrifices to a god are made

Related phrases:
Wikipedia
Altar (Dutch band)

Altar is a Dutch death metal band. The band started in the early 1990s under various names, including Manticore and Anubis, in the town of Hardenberg. Eventually they settled on Altar. In 1992 they released their only demo, which landed them at Displeased Records. After five full-lengths the band split up in 2001. From time to time, the classic line-up reunites to play a limited number of shows under the name Altar-native.

Altar (Wicca)

A Wiccan altar is a "raised structure or place used for sacrifice, worship, or prayer", upon which a Wiccan practitioner places several symbolic and functional items for the purpose of worshiping the God and Goddess, casting spells, and/or saying chants and prayers.

Altar (dance music band)

Altar is a house music duo of Brazilian producers and DJs Macau and VMC. Formed in 2001, the duo began receiving recognition in nightclubs in 2003 after the release of their single "Sexercise". A collaboration with vocalist Jeanie Tracy, "Party People" became their first number-one hit on the U.S. Hot Dance Club Play chart in early 2007.

Altar

An altar is any structure upon which offerings such as sacrifices are made for religious purposes, and by extension the 'Holy table' of post-reformation Anglican churches. Altars are usually found at shrines, and they can be located in temples, churches and other places of worship. Today they are used particularly in Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Shinto, Taoism, as well as in Neopaganism and Ceremonial Magic. Judaism used such a structure until the destruction of the Second Temple. Many historical faiths also made use of them, including Greek and Norse religion.

Altar (Romanian band)

Altar is a Romanian metal band from Cluj Napoca, that formed in 1991. After a couple of local shows, the band had their first national concert at the '91 Samrock Festival, where they won the prize for the most popular band. After the performance at the Timişoara '92 Studfest, Altar was considered the revelation of the festival. They enjoyed enormous success afterwards, releasing five albums and becoming one of the most important metal bands in Romania.

Altar (disambiguation)

Altar is a religious structure for sacrifices or offerings.

Altar may also refer to:

  • Altar (Catholicism)
  • Altar (Bible)
  • Altar (Wicca)
  • Altar (dance music band), a Brazilian dance music band
  • Altar (Dutch band), a Dutch death metal band
  • Altar (Romanian band), a Romanian metal band
  • Altar (Sunn O))) and Boris album), 2006
  • Altar (Hillsong album)
  • El Altar is an extinct volcano in Ecuador
  • Altar, Sonora, a small city and the surrounding municipality in the Mexican state of Sonora
  • Ara (constellation), small constellation "The Altar"
  • Altar (film), 2014 film also released as The Haunting of Radcliffe House
  • The Altar (rock), rock summit in Queen Maud Land of Antartica
  • " The Altar" an album by Banks
Altar (Catholicism)

In the liturgy of the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church, the altar is the table on which the Sacrifice of the Mass is offered. Mass may sometimes be celebrated outside a sacred place, but traditionally never without an altar, or at least an altar stone until recent changes, a corporal now being sufficient.

In the rites used in the Eastern Catholic churches, altar can also refer to the whole space surrounding the table within the church building (the area called the sanctuary in the West), with the table itself called the Holy Table.

Altar (Bible)

Altars (, mizbe'ah, "a place of slaughter or sacrifice") in the Hebrew Bible were typically made of earth or unwrought stone . Altars were generally erected in conspicuous places The first altar recorded in the Hebrew Bible is that erected by Noah . Altars were erected by Abraham , by Isaac , by Jacob , and by Moses (, Adonai-nissi).

After the theophany on biblical Mount Sinai, in the Tabernacle–and afterwards in the Temple–only two altars are mentioned: the Altar of Burnt Offering, and the Altar of Incense.

Altar (Hillsong album)

Altar is the twentieth album in the live praise and worship series of Christian Contemporary music by Hillsong Church Kiev.

And released at Easter day in March 2008

Altar (film)

Altar is a 2014 British horror thriller film directed by Nick Willing from his original screenplay. It is about a British family who move into a dilapidated old manor house out on the Yorkshire Moors, only to discover that it has a dark past. The film stars Olivia Williams as Meg Hamilton, Matthew Modine as Alec Hamilton, Antonia Clarke as Penny and Adam Thomas Wright as Harper.

Related phrases:

Usage examples of "altar".

He justly observes, that in the recent changes, both religions had been alternately disgraced by the seeming acquisition of worthless proselytes, of those votaries of the reigning purple, who could pass, without a reason, and without a blush, from the church to the temple, and from the altars of Jupiter to the sacred table of the Christians.

Standing naked before the horned altar, Aganippe struggled to stay awake, murmuring prayers she had recited since girlhood, while they painted her body with yellow ochre-- the earth color.

I began by showing him that Leticia Nazareno owed us for an amount of taffeta twice the nautical distance to Santa Maria del Altar, that is, one hundred ninety leagues, and he said aha as if to himself, and I ended up by showing him that the total debt with the special discount for your excellency was equal to six times the grand prize in the lottery for ten years, and he said aha again and only then did he look at me directly without his glasses and I could see that his eyes were timid and indulgent, and only then did he tell me with a strange voice of harmony that our reasons were clear and just, to each his own, he said, have them send the bill to the government.

Then, closing his right hand around its hilt, he turned to salute each of the four airts, beginning with the east, where the altar lay.

Before this fire, the only crypt whose existence was known of, was a small chamber under the platform of the high altar, no wider than the central aisle of the choir, and only equal to a bay and a half of that aisle in length.

At the east end of the south aisle of the choir stood the altar of All Saints, founded by Bowet.

I watched Alake take her place before her altar, which she had set up in the empty cargo hold on deck two.

Councillor Albedo, pacing back and forth in front of the altar once again.

Here Councillor Albedo quit pacing and stood directly in front of the altar.

I drew her gently into a closet where a soft divan formed a suitable altar for the completion of an amorous sacrifice.

God is he, for still The great Gods wander on our mortal ways, And watch their altars upon mead or hill And taste our sacrifice, and hear our lays, And now, perchance, will heed if any prays, And now will vex us with unkind control, But anywise must man live out his days, For Fate hath given him an enduring soul.

An apocryphal story repeated long after has Talleyrand at the Champ de Mars imploring Lafayette, who joined him at the altar, not to make him laugh.

He finished the repairs to the south arcading and south aisle begun by Abbot Hugh, built three altars, and vaulted the aisle.

In the very center is the ashram, with our altar, and I will tell more about that later.

The child, with face ashy white and eyes glistening, her spirit borne aloft by the fervent strains of the litanies, was gazing at the altar, where in imagination she could see the roses multiplying and falling in cascades.